


And We'll Never Be Lonely Anymore

by Traincat



Category: Fantastic Four (2015), The Amazing Spider-Man (Movies - Webb)
Genre: Domestic Fluff, M/M, Marriage, Marriage Proposal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-22
Updated: 2016-02-22
Packaged: 2018-05-22 13:50:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,315
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6081714
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Traincat/pseuds/Traincat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"The world just looks different once you've settled down," Johnny said loftily.</p><p>"Johnny," Sue said. "You're FaceTiming me from your husband's aunt's kitchen in your pajamas at 2PM."</p>
            </blockquote>





	And We'll Never Be Lonely Anymore

**Author's Note:**

> Remember the time Andrew Garfield said MBJ should play Spider-Man's love interest, and then MBJ was cast as Johnny Storm? Remember how I am _never letting that go_? Yeah. Written for the final day of SpideyTorch Week, which was participant's choice - so y'know, I hadn't gotten them married for six whole days, it was time to break that streak. I originally started writing this as a fluffy, established relationship, almost-everyone (Gwen, Victor) lives companion to my more serious, less-everyone-lives F4/TASM get together fic. So of course I finished this one first. It is totally, completely ridiculous but _I just want them to be happy_. The extent of my NYC courthouse marriage knowledge comes from messing around on their website for so long I was afraid I'd accidentally submitted paperwork requesting my own marriage to a Jonathan Storm.
> 
> Thank you to boatmamacita for being the just the biggest enabler and starting this whole thing by indulging me in late night conversation about JUST HOW RIDICULOUS it would be if Johnny and Peter got dumb college married, and also last night asking why I hadn't posted any F4/TASM fic yet this week. ♥ Title from Chapel of Love by The Dixie Cups. I also had I Can't Help Myself (Sugar Pie, Honey Bunch) on repeat a lot while writing this fic - not in the least because it's by The Four Tops, who are playing in Johnny's car during his introduction in Fant4stic.
> 
> [Gorgeous gorgeous gifs](http://timelordsandladies.tumblr.com/post/143347527027/quotes-are-from-traincats-wonderful-and-well) by [timelordsandladies!](http://timelordsandladies.tumblr.com)

"I know it's all fun and games when you're young and fancy free," Johnny said, waving his spoon loftily around. There was a twitch in Sue's eyebrow Johnny hadn't seen since he'd been five and the toy store employee told Sue a chemistry set was too advanced for little girls.

"I will hurl this phone across the room," she said. "That's your last warning to drop this."

"You have to think about the future!" he said. His phone was propped up against the milk carton and Sue stared out at him from the screen, her head in her hands.

"Oh my god," Sue said, putting her head down against the table. There was a muffled "what" from the background and a second later Reed's face appeared over her shoulder.

"Oh," he said. "Hi, Johnny."

"Just the man I wanted to see!" Johnny beamed.

"Noooo," Sue said as Johnny schooled his features into something resembling serious - mixed results, if the snort from the next chair over was anything to go by. "No, no, no -"

"Don't you think it's about time you two crazy kids tied the knot?" Johnny asked.

Reed turned bright red. Sue turned invisible.

"I'm going to kill you," Sue's disembodied voice promised while Reed stammered something about having to go, he'd left the particle accelerator on. "I will stay invisible and go to Queens and murder you in your sleep."

"The world just looks different once you've settled down," Johnny said loftily.

"Johnny," Sue said, flickering back into view. "You're FaceTiming me from your husband's aunt's kitchen in your pajamas at 2PM."

"Eating Lucky Charms dry out of the box," Peter chimed in helpfully, tossing a four leaf clover into his mouth. "Can I have the milk back now?"

"No, I need it," Johnny said, elbowing him.

"Hi, Peter," Sue said, voice full of defeat.

"Hi, Sue!" Peter said, opening his mouth so Johnny could toss him a marshmallow. Johnny fished around until he found a heart, because he was romantic like that. Peter made an 'aww' noise, catching the marshmallow out of the air like a seal.

"I'm hanging up now," Sue said.

"Love you!" Johnny called. He slipped his arm around Peter's shoulders and pulled him in until he could wave at Sue too.

"Please put real pants on," Sue said.

 

* * *

 

The proposal went like this:

"Oh god, oh god," Spider-Man said. Except it was hard to think of him as Spider-Man when he had his strong hands wrapped around Johnny's wrists, pulling him clear of the rubble, and when there was a huge tear down one side of the mask and Johnny could see his wild, terrified expression. Then he was just Peter, who two nights before had pressed Johnny down on his aunt's couch and kissed him senseless with Raiders of the Lost Ark on in the background. Just Johnny's boyfriend, a dumb thrill-seeking 20-year-old like him.

"You're okay, you're okay," he kept saying, "you're fine, you _dropped_ \--"

"Did not notice that while I was falling," Johnny coughed. Peter sucked in a ragged breath. Johnny caught him by the wrists, squeezing. "Wow. Hey, it's okay. I flamed on last second before I hit the ground. I'm really okay."

Peter nodded jerkily, cupping one hand to the back of Johnny's head. "I should've caught you."

"We were trying to kick a space god's ass," Johnny said. "I'm going to give you a pass this one time."

Peter's laugh was so shaky and awful that Johnny didn't have a choice: he wrapped his arms around him and held him tight. Peter's heart beat jackrabbit quick against his own chest, his hands flexed at Johnny's back.

"I'm okay," Johnny promised.

"Yeah," Peter said unsteadily. Johnny brushed a kiss against the side of the mask and pulled away.

The entire street was a disaster zone. Johnny sucked in a harsh breath.

"My sister," he said, looking around for them and finding nothing but more destruction. "Reed. Ben."

Peter didn't try to tell them they were fine. He just took Johnny's hand and squeezed once before letting go.

"Come on," he said, turning. "You take that side, I'll take this one."

He felt Sue before he saw her, a hazy heat outline standing on the street. She flickered into sight as soon as she saw him and he rushed her, grabbing her up in a hug.

"I was so scared," he admitted into her hair. There was a sound like shifting rubble behind him and Ben's deep sigh.

"You're fine," Sue said, stretching up on her toes even as he tried to fold himself against her, bent nearly double so he could rest his forehead against her shoulder. Her arms came up around him, holding tight. "You're fine, I'm fine - Spider-Man?"

"He's okay," Johnny said, mortified at the way he sniffed once before he let go.

"Okay," Sue said, and Ben's big hand came down at his shoulder. Johnny closed his eyes and just let himself have the moment.

When he opened them Peter and Reed were limping through the destruction together, heads bent in some kind of genius huddle. Ben let out a sigh of relief.

"Don't do that again," he told Reed. Reed's smile was a little wobbly.

"Little hard to crush now, buddy," he said, laughing shakily. Sue let go of Johnny so she could grab Reed's hand, inspecting a rip in his suit.

Peter had kept walking down to the corner, where a corner shop had been demolished. He was moving the rubble, arms straining with the effort. Johnny went to help.

"Thanks," Peter grunted, even though there wasn't a lot Johnny could add to his effort.

"No problem," he said. Johnny marveled all the time at Peter's easy strength, the way he lifted cars and chunks of concrete and the one occasion he'd wanted to get around Johnny so he'd just picked him up without a second thought. It never failed to leave Johnny wanting, sparks under his skin. "I don't think there's anyone in here."

Peter let a shelf slip from his grip, rocking back on his heels with a relieved sigh. "Yeah. Yeah, I think we're okay."

People were starting to filter back out onto the street, some pointing at the sky, some pointing at Ben. Peter raised a hand to his face, touching the rip in his mask.

"I think I'm going to swing somewhere a little less visible," he said, shooting a webline towards a roof across the street.

"Be right there," Johnny said, toeing through the wreckage. Something caught his eye and he turned to watch Peter swinging away, effortlessly graceful, as he bent to pick it up.

 

* * *

 

The first time Johnny saw Spider-Man he was leaving Baxter, so furious with his dad and Sue and Victor that he was nearly coming out of skin. Then Spider-Man had swung by, shouting, "One side, citizens!" and like a switch had been flipped, all that anger turned to wonder.

"Amazing," he'd said to himself, wondering how it felt to be free like that. High above the city with nobody to pull you down.

The second time he saw Spider-Man, it was a year and a half later, he was on fire and Spider-Man was yelling at him. A lot. Sue hit him in the face with a force field, which she confessed afterwards she felt bad about, but that at the time it had seemed like the easiest thing.

Johnny had felt embarrassingly fluttery for a whole day afterwards.

Rinse and repeat for times three through eight, until the night a man made out of sand tied him and Spider-Man together back-to-back and left them in the Hudson, fighting for breath. They were both half-drowned by the time Johnny dragged them onto the pier, Spider-Man trying to breath through his soaked mask. It had come off in the end, and underneath was some angular, unassuming guy, blue-lipped with his brown hair lying soaked against his forehead. He was trying to joke around his chattering teeth, big Bambi eyes too huge in the dark.

"Guess the cat's out of the bag," he'd said, then coughed river water up onto Johnny's shoes.

So it was love at ninth sight, more or less.

 

* * *

 

"One hell of a view," he said when he caught up with Peter.

"You know what they say about a bird's eye view," Peter said, standing way out on the edge of the roof. He held one hand out to Johnny. "C'mere."

Johnny joined him and Peter didn't hesitate one second before wrapping himself around him like a sweater, one arm around Johnny's waist and his face pressed against Johnny's shoulder.

"You just love me because I'm a human heating pad," Johnny said, frowning at a nasty scrape down Peter's left shoulder.

"And don't you ever forget it," Peter groaned, slumped bonelessly against him.

There was a moment, standing there with Peter by his side looking down at the wreckage, Peter's hand caught loosely in his own, Peter's thumb stroking over his knuckles, where Johnny thought he felt something shift.

"Hey," he said, nudging Peter. Peter groaned, less happy this time, and buried his face deeper in Johnny's shoulder. "Almost got stepped on by a space god."

"And eaten," Peter mumbled. "Big day."

"We survived," Johnny said. "Big bad came down and we made it through. Still standing, whole planet and everything."

"Whoo. Go team us," Peter said, the world's least enthusiastic cheer. "I think I'm going to pass out or throw up. Not sure which."

"Big beautiful sky up there," Johnny said, choosing to ignore him. "It could've come down on us, but it didn't."

He toyed with the plastic wrapper between his fingers, then peeled one of Peter's hands from his waist and pressed the ring pop into his palm.

Peter stared down at it. "Uh? Thanks?"

"Let's get married," Johnny said.

Peter's head snapped up. Johnny waited, heart hammering against his chest. He hadn't realized how bad he wanted it until he said it. Him and Peter and rings, forever and the whole shebang. Married to Peter, yeah, that's what he wanted.

Sue was going to kill him.

"You kidding?" Peter said, a little squeaky. Johnny shook his head, throat too tight to talk. "You're not kidding."

"Not even a little bit," Johnny said. "World almost ended - me asking you to marry me is not the weirdest thing you've seen all day. C'mon, Pete - marry me?"

"Alright," Peter said after a long moment. "Yeah. Why not?"

The two sweetest words in the English language: why not.

Johnny fumbled with the wrapper, tearing it open. He took one of Peter's long-fingered, delicately boned hands in his own and slid the ring pop - blue raspberry, to match his costume - onto his finger.

Peter turned his face towards him and said, "Really?"

"Really what?" Johnny said. "Really we've been engaged twenty seconds and you're already criticizing me really? Because most people wait until after the wedding."

"I wanted to get an early start," Peter said, laughing around the words when Johnny groaned. "Figured I should let you know what you're in for. Just endless nitpicking, day in and day out. I'm never gonna let up."

"Bye," Johnny said, moving to pull away. Peter grabbed him around the waist, pulling him back.

"Oh no," he said. "You want to _marry me._ You _love me_."

"Yeah well," Johnny said. "Your aunt owns property. This whole superhero thing falls through, I'm gonna need a backup plan."

"User." Peter's grip tightened around Johnny's waist. "I need something to look forward to. My microbiology test's definitely not canceled now."

"Let's do it right now," Johnny said.

"You kidding?" Peter said. "You're not kidding."

"The planet didn't get eaten," Johnny said. "What better way to celebrate?"

"Sleeping for three days," Peter said. He gave a long, fond sigh. "Okay, but if the courthouse got stepped on we're getting Five Guys and going home."

"Deal," Johnny said.

"And you gotta let me change first," Peter said, ever the romantic. "Pretty sure they're gonna want to see some ID and I don't keep it in these tights."

Johnny started humming in his ear, "Who cares, baby? I think I wanna marry you!"

 

* * *

 

They made it back to Queens, all according to plan, but then Peter's bed was right there. It looked warm and inviting, still unmade, and Johnny had spent a disturbing portion of the day being tossed around by a space god. He hit the mattress face first and woke up hours later, face against the back of Peter's neck. His arm was slung over Peter's waist and their legs were tangled together, Peter's bare feet brushing Johnny's. He shivered, but not because they were cold.

It was dark in the room except for the glow from Peter's phone.

"What're you doing?" Johnny asked. Peter shifted, twisting around until they were face to face.

"You know you can apply for a marriage license online?" he said, holding the phone high above their heads. "The future is wild."

Johnny stilled, remembering - the fight, the proposal. Peter saying yes. He ducked his head and smothered his grin against Peter's bare skin.

"It's pretty good," he said. "I like it a lot."

"Hey," Peter said. Johnny looked up. Peter was looking at him with those big brown eyes, brow just slightly furrowed like he was trying to put a puzzle together. Johnny had no idea how he did it, but he always managed to light him up from the inside out.

He touched careful fingertips beneath Peter's chin and kissed him in the glow of the cell phone light. Peter smiled against his mouth and slapped a hand against his chest.

"What?" Johnny asked. "Trying to kiss my fiancé here."

"Fiancé needs your middle name," Peter said, waving the phone back and forth.

"Let me see," Johnny said, grabbing the phone. "It says 'optional.' Why didn't you put my occupation down as superhero?"

"Because I actually want them to marry us," Peter said.

"Unemployed makes me sound like I'm going to be your house husband," Johnny said. He held the phone out of the way when Peter reached for it, propping himself up on one elbow so he could grin down at him. "Am I going to be your house husband, Parker?"

"You've discovered my cunning plan," Peter said. "As soon as that ring was on your finger, it was going to be all, dust the bannister, Johnny."

"Sexy."

"Get me my dinner, Johnny. Burnt fishsticks again, Johnny?"

"Less sexy."

"Come here," Peter said, snickering a little. He cupped a hand around the back of Johnny's head and pulled him down on top of him. "I want that middle name."

"Tough," said Johnny. He hummed a little, sinking his fingers into Peter's messy hair. Peter's fingers danced down Johnny's back in time to the beat. "Going to the chapel and we're gonna get married... Gee I really love you, and we're gonna get maaa~rried..."

"Going go to the city clerk's office to pay them thirty-five dollars," Peter sang out of tune.

"Why you gotta be so unromantic?" Johnny asked and kissed him stupid before he could continue butchering the classics.

 

* * *

 

The 24 hour wait was the longest of Johnny's life.

 _we need a witness_ , Peter texted in the afternoon.

"Ben," Johnny said, "I'm getting married. Want to be the witness?"

"Sure," Ben said without looking up. "Maybe after that you can come to my coronation, 'cause I'm about to be crowned the Queen of England."

Scratch Ben off the list, then. Johnny didn't need that kind of negativity on his wedding day.

"Reed, my man," he said, singling out the next most obvious target. Reed hummed in reply, his neck stretched at a weird angle and one hand scribbling notes a whole table away. Perfect - Reed blindly agreed to pretty much anything when he was in the middle of working. Johnny settled his crossed arms down on Reed's back. "If I text you an address and a time, can you show up tomorrow? I just need you for a quick thing."

"Sure," Reed said. Johnny patted him on the shoulder.

"Good talk, Reed," he said fondly, getting a hum in reply.

 _witness secured_ , he sent Peter. _operation going to the chapel is a go._

 _cool_ , Peter replied half a second later. _swinging over the bridge now ttyl_

Johnny kicked his feet up and smiled at his phone. Being engaged was pretty great.

At least it was until Sue stuck her head around the corner and said, "What do you need Reed for?"

Johnny cringed. "Could you be more visible, please?"

"I'm visible right now," she said, Big Sister Voice and all. "Johnny, what do you need Reed for tomorrow?"

"It's a guy thing," Johnny hedged, one last desperate bid not to have to text Peter all, _sorry to ditch you at the aisle, my sister trapped me in an invisible box and is making me live out the rest of my days as a mime._

"A guy thing," Sue repeated. "And so you... asked Reed?"

Alright, Johnny had trapped himself in a corner there. He sighed once, long and low, heat curling nervous in his chest as he laid the cards on the table. "Peter and I are getting married."

Sue didn't bat an eye.

"Funny," she said. "What's the real reason?"

"That is the real reason," Johnny said. "Peter and I are going to the courthouse tomorrow and we're getting married."

For one horrible moment it was like Sue was frozen - then she fell back into her chair.

"No," she said.

"Yeah," he admitted.

"No," she said. "I mean I am telling you, no."

He bristled. Here it was, the exact reason he hadn't wanted to tell her. "It's so weird how I'm an adult and you can't actually tell me what to do."

"If you were an adult you wouldn't be doing this," Sue shot back. "God, Johnny, think about what Dad would say."

Johnny knew exactly what their father would've said.

"Do me a favor?" he said to Sue over his shoulder as he left the room. "Don't come to my wedding."

 

* * *

 

"I don't think I'm supposed to see you before the wedding, right?" Peter asked when Johnny found him sitting out on his porch steps, notes spread out all around him and textbook open by his knee. His hair stuck up at all angles. His shirt was on inside out.

"Tough," Johnny said, flicking the tag on Peter's shirt as he collapsed into his space. "Missed you too much."

"Sure," Peter said, letting Johnny kiss him once, quick and close-mouthed. Johnny wasn't sure how you were supposed to feel about your husband-to-be clearly reading a textbook over your shoulder while you were trying to be romantic, but he didn't mind too much. He'd lived his entire life around the academically inclined.

"I told Sue," Johnny admitted. "She wasn't happy."

Peter made a sympathetic noise. "You want to call it off?"

"No," Johnny said, heart aching. "God, no."

"Okay," Peter said, tugging Johnny's head down so he could press his lips to his forehead. "I'm sorry. We gonna talk about it?"

Johnny knew what his dad would have said about the wedding, but wondered what he would've thought about Peter. He thought he would have liked him - Peter was smart, quick on his feet, and had absolutely no concern for his own personal safety. He was perfect Baxter material.

If Peter had gone to Baxter, Johnny probably would have hated him, though. He bit the inside of his cheek, tilting his head to kiss Peter's cheek instead. "Nah. Distract me. Hey, I love you."

"Mm, love you too," Peter said, clumsily patting at his chest. "Hey, quiz me on this?"

 

* * *

 

"Anna Watson said you two were out on the steps canoodling last night," May Parker said, bustling into the kitchen. "That was her word, not mine. Canoodling."

Peter cleared his throat awkwardly, shooting Johnny a nasty look when Johnny nudged his foot under the table. "Long night, Aunt May. Studying."

"Canoodling," Johnny whispered, earning himself a sharp elbow to the ribs. He grabbed at Peter's hand, tangling their fingers together and squeezing until Peter ducked his head to hide his grin.

"Ah," said May, tonelessly, as she fetched something from the cabinets. Johnny tried to watch her without looking like he was watching her - May Parker was tiny and harried and sharp as a tack. Johnny didn't even remember his own mom, but he knew from the photos and his dad and Sue's stories that she was nothing like May; he felt lost just looking at her and the confusing, never-miss-a-step rhythm she and Peter shared.

With a jolt like ice water, he realized he had just signed himself up to be her son-in-law. His spoon slipped from his grip, clattering against his bowl. Peter snuck him a sideways, confused look.

"Need anything, sweetheart?" May called, glancing over her shoulder.

"I'm fine, thanks," Johnny said, swallowing hard. Peter's bony ankle knocked against his own underneath the table. His hand caught Johnny's once more, squeezing, before he pushed his chair back from the table.

Johnny caught on to what Peter was planning just as Peter tapped his aunt on the shoulder, gently spinning her around, and by then it was too late to run.

"May," Peter said, voice soft, big hands squeezing her small shoulders. Johnny wondered how obvious it would be if he just sank under the table and stayed there until it was all over. "I have something I have to tell you, but I need you to promise me -"

"Peter, for god's sake, what is it?" May asked, wrinkle forming between her eyebrows.

"I need you to promise you won't hit me with that dish towel," Peter said, face perfectly serious. Johnny snorted a little.

"Why on earth would I hit you with a dish towel?" May demanded.

"Because I'm getting married," Peter said. He chanced a glance at Johnny and grinned widely. "We're getting married. Today."

May sucked in a gasp. Then she hit Peter with the dish towel.

"Surprise?" Johnny said helplessly.

 

* * *

 

"I thought, okay, we'll rent a catering hall," May said, nose wrinkling. She was wearing a beige suit, the kind Johnny didn't know people actually wore, and she looked spectacularly Mother of the Groom. It made the whole thing feel real in a way it hadn't before. "But a courthouse wedding?"

Peter laughed, a little high and strangled. "You and Uncle Ben got married in a courthouse!"

"Yes, but Ben and I were broke and stupid," May said.

"I don't really see how we're any different," Peter said, grinning at Johnny.

"Well I was hoping for broke and smart," May said, throwing her hands in the air. She pulled something - a handkerchief, Johnny thought, but who the hell still carried handkerchiefs? What was he marrying into? - out of her purse and stuffed it into Peter's hand. "There. Something borrowed."

"Thank you," Peter said, grinning down at her. "Hey, I love you."

She made a frustrating noise, grabbing him up in a hug. Her eyes looked wet. Johnny had to swallow around the lump in his throat, briefly looking away. "I love you too. Go, get married."

What Johnny wasn't expecting was Sue, standing in the one nice dress she owned, waiting for him with Reed and Ben flanking her.

"I know you told me not to come," she started, only to get cut off when he hugged her.

"I'm sorry," he said. "I didn't mean it."

"I don't understand you," Sue muttered into his shoulder, like that was some new, personal failing, or like Johnny understood the easy, organized patterns of her thoughts any better. "But I wouldn't miss this." She ran her hand over the bristle of his hair, gently, like their dad used to do when Johnny was upset as a kid. "Dad wouldn't have, either."

"I know," Johnny said, pulling away from her embrace. "Why the hell is Rocky here?"

"Are you kidding?" Ben asked, voice muffled by his gigantic coat. "I wouldn't miss this disaster for a million bucks."

"I've just never been to a wedding before," Reed said, looking so excited Johnny had to hold out his hand for another weird half-fist bump, half-high five. "We're a team, we're supposed to show up for these things."

"So I marry him, I marry all of you?" Peter put in, unhelpfully. "Cool, because I actually really wanted Ben."

"You can't afford me," Ben said.

Every after that was a blur - "Did they call our names yet?" "Not unless your name is Rozwadowski, no." - and then all of a sudden, it was over. One kiss, Peter's sweaty palms in Johnny's always dry ones, pronounced husband-and-husband, 'til probably costumed vigilante-involved death did they part.

"Spencer Lowell," Peter said, smiling full force at Johnny, crinkled up eyes and everything. He made Johnny feel too warm, the way he hadn't since the accident.

"You got something to say, Benjamin?" There was absolutely nothing mockable about Benjamin. Also, it made him feel like he was talking to Ben. Johnny switched tactics. "Your eyebrows are stupid."

"I'm rubber, you're glue," Peter said, giving him a chaste, courthouse appropriate kiss. "Well, actually, I'm glue, you're a bic lighter, but you know what I mean."

Johnny was pretty sure no vows had ever been more romantic.

"You aren't going to hyphenate alphabetically?" Reed said as they were walking out.

"We thumb-wrestled for it," Peter said as Johnny threw his arm over his shoulder, tugging him against his side. Peter's hand came to rest at his hip, like it was automatic. Married, Johnny thought to himself, and tried not to smile too hard. "He thought he could win for some reason."

"Powers are cheating!" Johnny said. "We said powers were cheating!"

"Who said anything about powers?" Peter asked, laughing. "Onward, Mr. Storm-Parker. I was promised a romantic honeymoon."

 

* * *

 

Johnny had tried to get them a hotel for the night, but even pooling his savings together with Peter's Bugle money - it had seemed like a waste. Peter needed things, like tuition and textbooks and subway fare ("Can't swing everywhere, though not for lack of me trying.") and Johnny was a man fairly often on fire. Clothes weren't cheap.

His dad's estate would have left him money, an even split between him and Sue, but there was no body, and no location of death except somewhere so classified he and Sue would be chewing red tape for the rest of their lives at this point. The thought left a bitter taste in Johnny's mouth.

They worked with Peter's bedroom instead, Peter easily tripping Johnny onto the bed and actually webbing the door shut.

The small TV in the corner switched on when Johnny landed on the remote. He laughed when Peter climbed on top of him.

"Hey, husband," he said, lacing his fingers behind Peter's neck and kissing him stupid. "You know what this means, right?"

"You cannot have half my spider-suit," Peter said, longer clever fingers working at Johnny's fly. Johnny pressed up into his touch, eyes falling shut.

"I was going to say it means you are now legally required to fuck me into your ancient twin-sized mattress," Johnny said, pausing briefly to suck on Peter's bottom lip.

"Oh, thank you, city of New York," Peter groaned.

"But now I'm thinking I'd rather have the tights," Johnny said.

Peter bit him, hand slipping under Johnny's shirt, cold fingers against his stomach. Johnny hissed a little, cranking up his body temperature. Peter's hands were always freezing. He tugged at Peter's shirt, leaning up into his touch.

"You're wearing way too much," he said. "Take it off, c'mon, I married a superhero, I get to see muscles."

"You've seen them already," Peter said, but he did pull back so he could pull his shirt over his head. Johnny took the opportunity to shed his own jeans before Peter practically fell back on top of him, grinding down, his hands slipping under Johnny's thighs and traveling up, palming his ass.

"Yeah, but I own them now," Johnny said, grinning sharp as he ran his hands down Peter's hard chest. "Legally. This is all mine."

Peter's sharp, uncontrollable laugh never failed to set off sparks in Johnny's chest.

It was good for a moment, and then Peter went weirdly still, his head cocked to the side. Johnny was about to ask what was wrong when he heard the TV: _"- and now, a closer look at the situation by the Lincoln Tunnel."_

"Seriously?" Johnny asked the ceiling. "Really? Right now?"

"Hey, look," Peter said, ignoring him. He nudged Johnny's shoulder. Johnny lifted his head like it was some terrible chore. "Look, is that - a guy with wings?"

Johnny squinted at the grainy image on screen. "That is an old man with wings, robbing a traffic jam."

"Are you thinking what I'm thinking?" Peter said, looking vaguely starry-eyed in that way that meant the mask was coming out.

"That I'm never getting lawfully wedded laid?" Johnny said. Peter groped him once, lovingly, before he practically fell off the bed, reaching for his costume buried at the bottom of his backpack.

An hour later Peter was webbing an old man calling himself the Vulture to the side of the highway while Johnny flew in warning circles around them. It was, Johnny reflected, a weird world.

"Happy wedding day," Peter said when they were done, grin clear as day even through the mask. He was so ridiculous. Johnny rolled his mask up with careful fingers til it rested on the bridge of his nose just to kiss him.

"Happy wedding day," he agreed. "So much for the wedding night."

 

* * *

 

One month into being married, almost to the day, Peter came down with some kind of death flu.

"M'not sick," Peter said miserably, and Johnny wouldn't have believed him even if he couldn't practically see the heat coming off of him, like a shimmer in the air through the windshield on a hot day.

Johnny had never said it because it was weird, but he liked how Peter's body heat felt. Familiar, comforting. He could put his head down against Peter's bony shoulder after a long day and wrap his body heat around himself like a blanket.

Peter felt wrong.

"Yeah, I kind of think you are," Johnny said, then yelped when Peter pitched forward and his head met the wall. "Okay, okay. Back to bed. You're not swinging anywhere."

Peter made a miserable noise as Johnny tilted his head back, hissing at the mark. "I'm totally fine, I gotta go, I've got class -"

"You've got a bruise forming on your head the same shape and size as Texas," Johnny said. "You're a total disaster. Don't make me sit on you. What the hell happened? What time did you even get in last night? May and I waited." Waited and binge-watched all of _Mind of a Chef_ on Netflix, he didn't add.

"Dunno," Peter said. "Got hit with something. I'll be okay."

"Yeah, but until then, you're staying here with me and watching dumb daytime television," Johnny said, hand pressed to Peter's forehead. "Unless we go to the hospital, which is a thing I'm thinking about right now, I have to say."

"No hospitals," Peter said, nose wrinkling.

"I get that," Johnny said, taking his hand away and replacing it with his lips, feeling the sheer heat coming off of Peter. "But we might need to make an exception."

"No," Peter said, grabbing Johnny by the wrist. So sick he was literally falling over, but his grip was still like iron. It did a little to calm the panicked beat of Johnny's heart. "No hospitals. Radioactive spider blood. If they run any tests - I don't know what they're going to find. Promise me, Johnny."

Johnny nodded, miserable.

"Promise me," Peter repeated.

"Promise," Johnny said. He'd break it, if he had to. "Come back to bed with me now?"

Their second trip to Planet Zero had settled something in them, like hitting the reset switch on a faulty connection. Johnny's powers before had felt like something that existed just outside his reach, the ability to reign them in on his own like clutching a handful of sand. Now all his fire ran through his veins, curled comfortably under his skin. Testing the boundaries still felt shaky, but he tried anyway, exhaling as he cranked his own body temperature up. No fire, just heat: the Human Radiator.

"You're warm," Peter said, face against Johnny's neck and hands plastered against his back.

"No shit," Johnny said, nose in Peter's messy, sweaty hair. It should've been gross. It was kind of gross, but Johnny didn't even care, not with the way he thought his heart would hammer out of his chest every time Peter's cough wracked his body. "It's why you married me, right?"

"Mm," Peter mumbled, squeezing Johnny's sides.

Peter's fever broke around midnight. Johnny curled one hand around the back of Peter's neck and tried not to think too hard about it.

He woke up a couple hours later and couldn't figure out why for a second, burying his face in the pillow to try and get away from the noise. Peter groaned, slapping at Johnny's shoulder.

"Skype," he said. "Turn it off."

"You turn it off," Johnny grumbled.

"I'm injured," Peter said. "I'm an injured man. You tried to make me go to a _hospital_."

When Johnny had been a kid, his dad had a King Charles Spaniel. The look Peter was giving him right then contained the exact same amount of betrayal Ada Lovelace (Sue's choice) had always worn when the car had rolled up in front of the vet's office.

The Skype call ended on its own and Johnny breathed a sigh of relief. He buried his nose in Peter's hair and shut his eyes.

Two seconds later, it started again.

"Make it stop," Peter said, pulling the pillow out from under Johnny's head and over his own. Johnny gave in, rolling out of bed, and spared a moment to be thankful cold floors didn't bother him anymore.

He meant to shut Peter's computer down, but a noise from outside the window startled him and next thing he knew his hand had slipped and he'd accepted the call.

There was a blonde girl staring blearily out at the screen, a pencil stuck in her hair like an afterthought. Her sweater was both expensive and on inside out. It took a second for her face to click - she was the girl in the photo that still hung on Peter's wall.

"Oh," she said. "I was trying to call Peter, and you - You're the guy in the Facebook post. The one that says Peter got married."

"Um," Johnny said. Her eyes were getting very, very wide.

"Is it true?" she demanded, leaning forward with frightening intensity. "Did Peter get - Peter!"

Johnny turned just in time to see Peter sitting up in bed, his hair everywhere.

"Gwen?" he said, sounding fuzzy. Johnny wanted to tell him to get back into bed, that he had to sleep it off, but Peter was squinting at the screen and the girl - Gwen, terrifyingly smart, beautiful, left for England Gwen, he remembered - was staring back at him and suddenly Johnny felt as invisible as his sister.

"Peter!" Gwen said, leaning forward wide-eyed. "What happened to your head?"

"It met a nice wall," Peter said, coming to stand behind Johnny. "They were very happy together."

"Oh, ha ha. Was it, you know..." Her eyes flickered from Peter to Johnny and then back again. "... Arachnid-related?"

Subtle.

"No, it wasn't _Spider-Man_ related," Peter said, rolling his eyes and then wincing. Johnny got out of the chair so Peter could fall into it, even as he started talking.

"She knows?" he said. "Hot Oxford Gwen knows?"

"Hot Oxford - Peter, did your - whatever just call me Hot Oxford Gwen?" Then, before either of them could say anything: "Wait, _he knows_?"

"I'm his husband," Johnny said hotly. To Peter, he added, "How long has she known?"

"Ehh," Peter said, propping his elbow up on the desk all faux casual. "Not that long. Since our first date."

"Since your - I had to drag your sorry ass out of the river!" Johnny said. "Your mask was all ripped so you said, 'cat's out of the bag', laughed hysterically to yourself and then fainted on me!"

Peter shrugged and said, "You have to admit it was memorable."

"Gentlemen!" Gwen interrupted. "As romantic as that river story sounds, I'm really going to need you to focus - _you got married_?!"

Johnny and Peter looked at each other. Peter still looked like he'd been hit by a truck, the expression on his face weirdly guilty. Because of Gwen? Johnny felt sick.

"Yeah," Peter said after a moment, lifting his hand so Gwen could see his cheap plain wedding ring. Johnny touched his own beneath the desk, looking at Gwen's soft tousled hair and pretty mouth and wondering if he was the second choice yet again. Then Peter glanced at him, grinning, bright as the sun. "We got married."

Johnny's shoulders relaxed, just a little.

"What the actual hell," said Hot Oxford Gwen.

 

* * *

 

Johnny woke up two days later feeling like his head was stuffed up with cotton, limbs aching, throat sore.

"Your spider-germs did this to me," he accused miserably, curled on his side. Peter made appropriately sympathetic if not entirely sincere noises, pressing his cool hands to Johnny's forehead, his cheek, the back of his neck.

"Hey," he said, leaning over Johnny. Johnny grabbed at him, trying to pull him down against his side. All he wanted was for Peter to curl up warm behind his back and let Johnny leech at his body heat until he felt less like death warmed over. "Hey, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I have to go. I've got class."

"I hate you," Johnny told him sincerely, twisting to bury his face in the pillow.

"I'm sorry," Peter said again. He pressed his lips to the back of Johnny's neck. "May's home early today, though, so if you need anything, she's home. You won't even have to go downstairs. She's going to want to bring you soup."

Johnny's stomach twisted at the thought. The last time he'd been sick Sue had burned a can of Campbell's and he'd eaten it anyway because she'd looked so furious that, super-genius that she was, a can of chicken and stars had defeated her. His dad had come back from work late in the evening with a pile of dumb movies in his hands.

"Hey, c'mon," Peter pressed, nose tucked against Johnny's neck. "I'm really sorry. I'll bring you back whatever you want."

"A better husband," Johnny muttered.

"Okay," Peter said, laughing a little. "Okay, I promise, I'll web you the best one I see. Hey. I love you."

"Love you too," Johnny said, shoving him. "Get out of my face."

He slept most of the morning, a hazy, light thing. He kept dreaming he was burning, waking up in a panic to find it hadn't been true. He dreamed of Planet Zero, too, of the green energy beneath the planet's cracks. Sometimes in his dreams he went with the other three down the cliff and it swallowed him whole instead of Victor.

In one dream, Victor's cynical features became Peter's curious ones, his outstretched hand just as fascinated by Planet Zero's energy. Johnny woke up from that dream with his face wet and he had to turn his head into Peter's pillow and just breathe the scent of him for a moment.

"You know what will cheer you up?" May said later, when she'd convinced Johnny to come downstairs and _eat something, for heaven's sake, you'll feel better_.

"The cure for the common cold?" Johnny hazarded, afraid to sneeze in case he set her couch on fire.

"Peter's baby photos," May said, brandishing a thick album. Johnny's head snapped up so fast he was dizzy.

"You're my favorite Parker," he said.

Peter as a little kid had been nothing short of adorable, all big glasses and bright grin. Johnny smiled so hard just looking at him.

"Who took the photo of him in laundry basket prison?" he asked.

"Oh, that was Ben," she said. "He always thought that kind of thing was funny. Meanwhile I had to go buy a new laundry basket when that one became part of a fort." May's smile softened as she touched the corner of a photo. "He was always such a quiet boy. I used to worry so much."

"And now?" Johnny said, chest all tight. It seemed impossible that this little kid with his glasses slipping down his nose and his big, bright smile could have grown up to be neurotic, impossible, amazing Peter.

"Now I still worry," May said quietly. Her fingers trembled on the edge of the page as she turned it. The next page was dominated by a large shot of Peter and a smiling man who must have been Ben Parker grinning ear-to-ear in front of the sea lions in Central Park Zoo. "Just for different reasons."

Johnny nodded, head and heart aching in equal measure. He pulled the blanket a little closer around his shoulders. "I'm sorry."

"Oh, sweetheart," May said, looking at him in a way that was probably supposed to make him feel less guilty about the way he goaded Peter into races across the city, or made stupid bets with him, dragged him into fights. Asked him to marry him. "No. Peter's - he's always been like this. Everything is so big with him. Ever since he was a little boy."

Johnny knew that, and he loved it - the way Peter threw himself into everything, into Spider-Man, into New York, into Johnny. But if he was honest with himself, it scared him too, sometimes, the thought that Peter might burn himself out one day. Johnny knew crashing and burning, and if Peter went out like that, it'd be one hell of an explosion.

Maybe that was why he'd rushed to marry him. Maybe because he felt there was no time to waste.

His throat felt too tight. He cleared it, awkward, and said, "I will pay you actual money if you have Halloween photos."

May's hand closed over his, like she knew what he'd been thinking and worried about the same. "Let me get the other album."

The door opened and shut half an hour later, Peter's familiar footsteps echoing through the house.

"Hey, loving family," he started, only to stop short when he saw the open photo album. He turned on his heel and headed towards the kitchen. "Nope, I am not seeing this!"

"You were adorable!" May called at his back.

"Thank you but no thank you!" Peter called back. He reappeared with a glass of orange juice, pressing it into Johnny's hand. "That better not be the album with the spaghetti and meatballs incident."

"I want the home movies," Johnny said. "I have rights, Pete."

"Nope," Peter said. "Not actually how that works. Give me the album."

"I liked your toilet paper mummy costume," Johnny said. "Both thrifty and seasonally appropriate."

"You're feverish, and I was eight," Peter said, defeated. "May, Anna Watson said to send you over. She's getting our mail again and she thinks her niece made off with your copy of People."

May made a frustrated noise, bustling out of the room. "I was _wondering_..."

Peter laughed a little, bending over the back of the couch to press his lips to Johnny's temple. "Hey, invalid. You doing okay?"

"Yeah," he said, grabbing Peter's hand and stroking his thumb over perpetually bruised knuckles. "But I wasn't kidding about those home movies."

 

* * *

 

"Six month anniversary's coming up," Johnny said, flipping a page of GQ. Why didn't those guys ever call him? Or Playgirl - he could be a centerfold. It was the married thing, he bet. Probably made him look too unattainable, all settled and shit. Maybe when Reed's super team took off. "What do you want to do?"

"Huh," Peter said, continuing his push-ups. Johnny didn't budge  from his spot on his back. "Probably kick a science experiment gone wrong in the face."

"That's what we did for our four month anniversary," Johnny said, rolling his eyes. "You're killing the romance here. The spark is _dying_."

"Two hundred," Peter said suddenly, standing and sending Johnny sprawling to the floor. "I don't know, I don't - I'm not a big anniversary guy, I guess."

He pushed his hands up into his hair, leaving it standing straight up. He reached down, grabbing Johnny by the hand and pulling him easily to his feet. Johnny wasn't sure he believed him - back when all he'd had was a name to put to the Spider-Face, he'd Facebook stalked Peter Parker pretty thoroughly, heart in his throat at all the photos of him and his pretty blonde ex, thinking, _damn_ , probably straight.

He remembered one post Gwen had made that she'd tagged Peter in, the two of them lying artfully in bed and beaming up at her phone, selfie-style: _SIX MONTHS._

"Not an anniversary guy, huh?" he said, words ashen in his mouth.

"I can crawl through your window with wilted flowers and I can web you inappropriate messages," Peter said. "But that's about as good as I get, romance-wise."

"We could go somewhere," Johnny suggested.

"With what money?" Peter asked, stretching. He was sweaty in the early morning light, his thin shirt sticking to him. Johnny kind of wanted to lick him, even though he was kind of mad. Maybe because he was a little mad. Maybe he just always wanted to lick Peter, pin him to the wall by those slim hips and go to town.

"Just somewhere in New York," Johnny said. "I fly, you swing - we could like, hang out on the top of the Empire State Building."

"Really?" Peter asked, glancing over his shoulder. "That's what you want to do?"

"Yeah!" Johnny said. "Think about it. How many people do you think have had anniversary sex at the top of the Empire State Building?"

Peter laughed. "I don't know, but I'd be willing to bet we wouldn't be the first. The Empire State Building? Really?"

"Sure," Johnny said. "Or, hey. Have you ever been to the Statue of Liberty?"

Peter rolled his eyes, good natured.

"I've lived in New York all my life, Johnny," he said, shedding his sweaty t-shirt. "Of course I've never been to the Statue of Liberty."

"Me neither," Johnny said, hands sliding down his waist. He rubbed his thumb over a scar on Peter's right hip, a thin angry reminder of a run-in with an armed robber. "It's perfect. Let's go."

"You're serious about this?" Peter said.

"It'll be great," Johnny said, leaning in to kiss him.

 

* * *

 

"What do you think?" Sue asked, smoothing the shirt out on the table.

"I think Reed wasn't actually serious about calling us the Fantastic Four, right?" Johnny asked, spinning idly around in his chair. Sue snorted.

"Reed's completely serious," she said. "You missed your chance to object."

"Why are they all blue?" Johnny asked, picking up the shirt. He shrugged it on; it was a little tight in the shoulders and arms, but it would probably fit Peter just fine. He liked the idea of it, Peter with the big 4 on his chest. Maybe he could get him to take a photo of himself in it.

"To match our uniforms," Sue said.

"The uniforms are going to be blue?" Johnny said. "What happened to the black?"

"What happened was that you missed the meeting," Sue said. "It's got black accents."

"No red, huh?" Johnny said. "The Torch and the Torchettes officially off the table?"

"It was never on the table," Sue said, tucking a lock of her hair behind her ear. "The day I willingly let anybody call me a Torchette is the day I've been bodysnatched."

"By the thing from Planet Zero?" Johnny muttered under his breath before he could stop himself. Sue looked up, eyes sharp.

"Do you worry about that?" she asked. Johnny shrugged a little, hands tucked in his pockets. "Johnny. You need to come to our meetings. This is the kind of thing we discuss, you know - not just where we're going, but where we've been."

"Yeah," he said. "I know. I'm going to, Sue, I swear."

She pressed her lips together, a thin line. "Look, I know you've - you've gone and made yourself this whole new life. But this will be good for him, too. He's smart, Johnny. When we get Baxter back off the ground..."

Johnny nodded, ducking his chin low. "Yeah."

Sue squeezed his elbow. "Keep the shirt, okay?"

Johnny wore it home.

"I've got a surprise," he said when Peter crawled in through the window, tugging at his jacket's zipper.

"Is it edible underwear, because I do not think that stuff is good for anyone," Peter said, tugging off his mask. His eyes focused on Johnny's chest, his eyebrows shooting up. "Oh, wow."

"Good wow or bad wow?" Johnny asked, tossing his jacket to the side. The shirt really was too small - it rode up a little bit when he stretched, showing off his stomach. Peter licked his lips, grin shy.

"It's good," he said. "It's really good. That's gonna be it? With the 4?"

"To match the uniforms," Johnny said. Peter crawled into the room proper, straightening up as his eyes swept over Johnny slowly.

"Uniform, huh?" he said.

"Blue," Johnny said, rolling his eyes.

"Blue's good," Peter said, hand coming to touch the 4, right over Johnny's heart. "I like you in blue."

Johnny huffed. "Off, I want out of this stupid shirt."

"No, it's good, it's, uh," Peter grinned, tugging a little at Johnny's neckline. "It's tight. You look good."

"Yeah?" Johnny said, grinning. He grabbed Peter by the belt loops, trying to reel him in, but Peter wouldn't be moved. His face had gone oddly serious and he reached out, adjusting Johnny a little, tilting his chin up.

"Okay, yeah," he said, nodding. "Hold that. I'm getting my camera."

"Are you serious?" Johnny said.

"Yep," Peter said, re-emerging from his closet with his camera in hand. "I want to take your picture. Go back the way I had you, that was perfect. Yeah, that's good, that's great. You're perfect."

He beamed at Johnny after he took the photo, so Johnny blew him a kiss. Peter took a photo of that too, laughing.

"You still gonna love me when you're famous?" Peter teased, taking one more shot.

"Until a younger model comes along," Johnny said, winking with just one spark. Peter burst out laughing, one hand clutched to his heart in mock offense.

"Guess I'd better enjoy it while I can," he said, raising the camera again. "Okay, Mr. Storm. Ready for your close-up?"

 

* * *

 

Victor came back. Of course Victor came back. How could Johnny have been so stupid as to think something like getting torn apart atom by atom in another world would keep Victor down?

"Biggest of the bads, huh?" Peter said, tone light. He'd just come in through the window, his suit weirdly sticky up one side, but Johnny couldn't care about that. He'd grabbed him immediately, wrapping himself around him, telling himself Peter was safe here with him. For the moment.

"Pete, please," Johnny said, curling his fingers around Peter's wiry wrist and squeezing, stroking his thumb over the webs. "Victor's different."

Peter frowned down at their joined hands, then looked back up at Johnny. He had that furrow between his eyebrows again; if he kept it up he'd have wrinkles before thirty. Johnny would probably have to divorce him. "This guy actually scares you? You?"

Johnny opened his mouth to explain, but couldn't.

"Hey," Peter said, palming Johnny's cheek. "Hey, look at me. It's okay."

It wasn't okay. Johnny had trusted Victor - worse yet, Johnny's dad had trusted Victor. He'd loved him, his second son, and Victor had turned around killed him just for being in the way. "It's really not."

"We're gonna handle it," Peter said, hands cupped to Johnny's face. "You and me and Sue and Reed and Ben. We're going to take care of it, okay?"

Johnny thought they already had, and now Victor was back. He shut his eyes.

"Promise me, Pete," he said, tugging at his suit a little, tracing the webs under his fingertips. "If you see green, you _run_ \- and I mean away from danger, not towards it."

Peter made a soft noise, tilting his head to kiss Johnny.

He did not, Johnny noted, promise him anything.

It was just his luck that when Victor finally made his move, Peter was there, cracking wise while Sue broke out the new uniforms. They didn't even get a chance to try them on before a shock wave swept through the building, a rumble like an earthquake as Victor faded in from the shadows.

Reed had theorized once, tipsy on the bottle of wine Johnny had nabbed from the desk drawer of one of the engineers in Central City, that the four of them had a natural defense against Victor - that their powers coming from the same source granted them some amount of immunity. It made sense, Johnny thought, explained why Victor had only been able to toss them around when he'd been exploding heads left and right, and when he'd -

Johnny didn't want to think about what Victor had done to his dad, ever. He didn't care that it was a neater death than he'd given to the others.

Peter had no defense against Victor - the wave knocked him back, sending him smacking into a wall. He fell in a crumpled heap to the floor. Johnny's yell was drowned out by the sound of his own flames springing up.

Victor waved one uncaring hand his way and Johnny went up like a roman candle, so hot he even felt it.

"Victor!" Reed said, trying to rush him, limbs everywhere. "Listen to me, it doesn't have to be this way -"

Reed went flying back into Sue, knocking the two of them to the ground as Victor took center stage in the middle of the room.

"I've waited so long for this. The four of you and," Victor broke off mid-hiss, his neon eyes flickering over Peter as he - Johnny exhaled, relief in his veins - struggled to his feet. "I have no idea who this is."

"Johnny's husband," Sue said.

"And Johnny's hus - wait," Victor said, stopping dead in his tracks. "Excuse me?"

"Johnny got married," Reed's muffled voice came from the floor.

"Johnny got _married_?" Victor spit the words out like poison. His gaze fell on Peter, who waved. Johnny grabbed his hand out of the air. He rounded on Sue and Johnny stiffened, grip on her arm probably too tight, trying to pull her behind him. "I... He... Susan, you allowed this?"

"Don't look at me," Sue muttered, then snickered something that sounded like _because I'm invisible_ to herself. Johnny was thinking concussion, probably. "He ran off to the courthouse and eloped all on his own."

"Reed helped," Ben said.

"I was tricked!" Reed said, pulling himself together just enough for indignation. "I mean, it was a beautiful ceremony." Aw, thought Johnny, quite possibly lightheaded with panic. "But I was definitely tricked."

Johnny would've been offended if Victor hadn't taken that moment to turn his Mountain Dew On Steroids gaze on him.

"I'm sorry," he said. "You got _married_?"

"I don't know why that's the part you're focusing on," Johnny said, "when you apparently _came here to kill us_."

"How old are you?" Victor demanded. "How long have I been gone? What does he _do_ , he looks like a degenerate high school student."

"I'm in college!" Peter said, sounding slightly offended. Johnny wanted to tell him that now was not the time, but Victor was actually waving his hands in the air, looking at Johnny like he was the crazy one.

"I just," he said, "cannot believe you got married! You!"

"You came here to kill me and you can't believe that maybe I wanted to marry my boyfriend before that happened?" Johnny shouted at him. Victor made a frustrated noise, and then yelped when Ben tackled him from behind.

"Sue!" Ben said. "Now!"

Sue faded back into sight - Johnny hadn't even seen her disappear - just as Victor knocked Ben off of him. He raised his hands but stopped short inches from his face, scrabbling at seemingly nothing as Sue screwed her face, hair sweaty, teeth bared.

It was an excruciating few moments before Victor's neon eyes rolled back and he slumped to the ground. Sue dropped her hands, letting out a long breath.

Johnny snuffed his flames, starting forward. "Is he dead?"

"No," Reed said, stretching out finger gingerly to feel for a pulse. "Just unconscious. That was great, guys. Just like we practiced."

"When did you practice this?" Johnny demanded.

"You missed that meeting, too," Sue said, sitting back on her heels and scrubbing at her face. She burst into hysterical laughter. "Married!"

Reed nudged Victor with his toe. "He's definitely out. I think I can build something to hold him, since obviously Sue keeping him in a force field full time is improbable."

There was a long moment of silence before Johnny said, "Sue let Victor take her to prom."

"As friends!" Sue yelped. "We went as friends!"

"Did he know that? Because I don't think he knew that," Johnny said. Peter stifled a giggle against his shoulder. Johnny slid his hand up into his hair, feeling for bumps. It was head injury town all over the place today.

"I am not on trial here, Teen Bride," Sue said, giving him a harmless force field shove.

"See?" Peter said, head on Johnny's shoulder. "I told you you guys had this. You have everything."

"I have you," Johnny said, arms wrapped tight around Peter.

"Ugh," Ben said. "Wake the Comeback Kid back up, I want to hear him yell at them some more."

 

* * *

 

Three days before his six month anniversary, Johnny's sister got the team stuck in an alternate dimension, a strange alien landscape like Planet Zero, but populated, a no-holds-barred, anything goes-style warzone ruled by an insect man who called himself Annihilus and hissed all his S sounds.

Johnny kind of really wanted to go home.

"I am missing my anniversary!" he said, hitting a bug with a fire ball. It shrieked and scuttled, but annoyingly did not stop trying to kill Reed. "I just want you all to remember that!"

"We remember!" Ben said. "How can we forget if you _never shut up about it_?"

By the time they made it back Johnny was sick to his stomach over it, barely stopping to change his clothes before he rushed home to Queens. It had snowed while he was gone and everything seemed frozen in time. His fingers shook, not with cold, when he practically crashlanded in Peter's yard, flames melting the snow in a circle all around him.

Peter stumbled out into the snow, wild-eyed and in his socks.

"Hey," Johnny said, grinning. He faltered a little, his knees like jelly. "Happy six month anniversary, dude."

Peter stared at him like a fish. "Anniversary was three days ago, actually."

"Yeah," Johnny said, fidgeting. "I kind of, uh, got that. It's been longer. For me."

"How much longer?" Peter asked.

"A month?" Johnny said. "Give or take."

"A month," Peter repeated, sounding numb. "And six days for me. I thought you were _dead_." His voice broke a little and Johnny felt horrible all over again.

"I know," Johnny said. "I know, I'm so sorry. I got back as soon as I could, but, god - Peter, it was amazing."

"You're going to tell me all about it as soon as I get my breath back and also maybe strangle you, because _I thought you were dead_ ," Peter said.

Johnny touched him gently, tugging at his open jacket. "I am so sorry."

"It's not your fault," Peter said, breathing out. "Guess this is how the other side feels, huh?"

Johnny had spent plenty of nights unsure whether or not to fly through the streets of New York, his heart hammering in his chest while he wondered whether or not Peter would make it back home.

"Little bit," he said. "It sucks, right?"

"You're okay, though?" Peter said.

"Yeah," Johnny said. "Yeah, it's - everything seems so small and so big right now, you know?"

"Nope," Peter said. "Explain it to me."

Johnny did what any loving husband would: he nailed Peter in the back of the head with a half-melted handful of snow. Peter squawked, snow soaking his hair and trickling down the back of his neck, slipping underneath his collar. He looked at Johnny, his eyes wide.

"Okay," he breathed. "Okay, that's how you want to play -"

Johnny didn't have time to react before Peter rushed him, knocking him down into the snow and pinning him there easily. He was breathless, pink-cheeked and bright-eyed with cold, and even with the snow melting all around them, soaking him through even as it continued to fall, Johnny was so caught up in him.

"You happy now?" Peter asked, braced above him.

Peter was wearing the blue Four shirt under his jacket. It hung a little loose on his narrower frame, and his hair was damp from the snow, hanging softly across his forehead. The wind blew snowflakes down around them, settling in Peter's hair and across his shoulders. A few stubborn flakes dotted his eyelashes and down his nose.

It was pretty okay, Johnny thought, grinning up at him. Everything was working out fine.

"Yeah," he said, and then shoved a handful of snow in Peter's face.


End file.
